5 And I will fetch a morsel on: for therefore are ye come to of bread, and comfort ye your your servant. And they said, So hearts; after that ye shalt pass do, as thou hast said. e Judg. 6. 18. & 13. 15. f Judg. 19. 5. Ps. 104. 15. g ch. 19. 8. & 33. 10. Judg. 9. 5, 'Comfort (Heb. 1750 stay) your hearts with a morsel of bread.' Hence bread is termed the staff of life, and the Lord threatens by the prophet, Is. 3. 1, to 'take away from Jerusalem and from Judah, the stay and the staff, the whole stay of bread and the whole staff of water.' 4. Let a little water be fetched, and sible the merit of every office he prowash your feet. That is, have them poses to perform for them. If they washed; for this was performed by are to be refreshed with water, he calls servants, and not by the guests them- it 'a little water;' and if with food he selves. Water for the feet is a neces- calls it 'a morsel of bread.' In order sary and most grateful part of hospital- to spare them the formality of apolity in the East. Where the people ogies and relieve them from the anxiewear sandals, which are intended only ty they might feel under the apprehento protect the soles, the feet soon be- sion of the trouble he might be at on come foul and parched; and to have their account, he says not a word of the feet and ankles bathed is the most the best of the entertainments which gratifying of refreshments after that of he determined to provide for them. quenching thirst. The office is usually -T Comfort ye your hearts. Heb. performed by servants. Mr. Roberts sustain, uphold, strengthmentions, that in passing through Hin-en your hearts. Gr. payɛoɛ eat. Thus doo villages it is common to see this office performed for the weary traveller. In the sandy deserts of Arabia and the bordering countries no covering for the feet can prevent the necessity for this refreshment at the end of a day's journey. The fine impalpable sand or dust penetrates all things, and, with the perspiration, produces an itching ye come to your servant. Heb. 'For -T For therefore are and feverish irritation, which, next to therefore have ye passed by (1129) to the quenching of his thirst, it is the your servant,' i. e. for this has it been first wish of a traveller to allay; and so ordered in Providence that your steps to uncover his feet, and to get water to have been conducted hither. Not that wash them, is a prime object of atten- he would intimate that their sole design tion. If sandals only are used, or the in passing that way was to avail themfeet are entirely without defence, it be- selves of his generous hospitality, but comes still more necessary to wash that God had so ordered things, that he them after a journey.' Pict. Bible. was bound to regard them and treat -¶ Rest yourselves. Heb. them as if sent with that special purlean ye down. Gr. karavžare refresh pose. The sentiment so casually intiyourselves.-T Under the tree. Col-mated in the text discloses a very inlect. sing. for 'trees,' as his tent stood teresting trait in Abraham's character in a grove. as a pious man. It shows how habit-, 5. I will fetch a morsel of bread. ually he recognised a superintending As before remarked, 'bread' among the and directing Providence. Hebrews was the general name for any incident so apparently fortuitous as the Even an kind of food. Nothing is more remark-passing by his door of a few strangers able than the refinement of this ad- he instinctively refers to the ordering of dress. He diminishes as much as pos- heaven, and therefore feels that in 6 And Abraham hastened into | ures of fine meal, knead it, and the tent unto Sarah, and said, make cakes upon the hearth. Make ready quickly three meas obeying the impulses of a benevolent heart he is at the same time discharging a duty expressly enjoined upon him by the circumstances of the case. His example teaches us to consider every unexpected opportunity for befriending our fellow-creatures as divinely afforded. So do as thou hast said. 'How exceedingly simple was all this! No compliment on either side, but such as a generous heart and sound sense dictate.' A. Clarke. great interest, and traced the analogies they afforded to the usages recorded in the Bible. As we shall have occasion to describe these processes in notes to the various passages which refer to them, we now only notice that which is supposed to be here intended, and which is still in use among the Arabs and other people of the East. It is done by kindling a fire upon the ground or hearth when the ground is sufficiently heated the fire is removed and 6. Abraham hastened into the tent the dough placed, and being coverunto Sarah. That is, into Sarah's ed with the hot ashes and embers is tent, into the woman's apartment, soon baked, although not so rapidly as which was separated from his.-Tby some other processes, the cakes beMake ready quickly three measures of ing thicker and not so wide as those in meal. Heb. D-ro wbw ¬¬n hasten most common use. Another process three seahs of meal. A'seah' contain- resembles this, except that, instead of ed about two gallons and a half.¶ the bare hearth, a circle of small stones Knead it, and make cakes upon the is arranged, and these being heated, the hearth. It seems very strange to us paste is spread over them, and then that in such an establishment as that overlaid with hot cinders. This is thinof the patriarch there was not ready ner than the former, and is only used baked bread for the strangers. But by the Arabs for their morning meal. the fact is, that in the East to this day, Sarah's process was probably the first so much bread and no more than will mentioned. It may seem extraordinasuffice for the household is baked daily,ry to see a lady of such distinction as as the common bread will not keep Sarah, the wife of a powerful chief, ocgood longer than a day in a warm cli-cupied in this menial service. But even mate. They also prefer bread when it now this duty devolves on the women is new. In the East, it is only in large of every household; and among those towns that there are bakers by trade. who dwell in tents, the wife of the In villages and camps every family proudest chief is not above superintendbakes its own bread; and while jour-ing the preparation of the bread, or neying in the East we always found even kneading and baking it with her that, except in towns, the women of own hands. Tamar, the daughter of a the familes which entertained us al-king, seems to have acquired distinction ways went to work immediately after as a good baker of bread (see 2 Sam. our arrival, kneading the dough and 13. 5-10); and there are few of the baking 'cakes,' generally on spacious heavy duties which fall upon the woround or oblong plates, of thin and soft men of the East which they are more bread, which were ready in an aston-anxious to do well, and get credit for, ishingly short time. We have often than this. It is among the very first watched the various processes with of an Eastern female's accomplish 7 And Abraham ran unto the young man; and he hasted to herd, and fetched a calf tender dress it. and good, and gave it unto a but on the occasion of some great festival, or on the arrival of a stranger. If the guest is a common person, bread is baked and served up with the ayesh ; if the guest is a person of some small consequence, coffee is prepared for him, and also a dish called behatta (rice or flour boiled with sweet camel's milk), or that called ftétat (baked paste, kneaded up thoroughly with butter); but for a man of some rank, a kid or lamb is killed. When this happens, the lamb is boiled with bourgoul (wheat dried in the sun after having been boiled) and camel's milk; and served up in a large wooden dish, around the edge of which the meat is placed. A wooden bowl, containing the melted fat of the animal, is put and pressed down in the midst of the boiled wheat; and every morsel is dipped into this melted 7. A calf tender and good. 'Here again the European reader is struck no less at the want of preparation than by the apparent rapidity with which the materials of a good feast were supplied. The dough was to be kneaded and the bread baked; and the meat had not only to be dressed but killed. The fact is, the Orientals consume a very small quantity of animal food; and the nom-fat before it is swallowed. A bowl of ades, with their ample flocks and herds, less than other Orientals. In our own journeys meat was never to be found ready killed, except in large towns, and then only in the mornings. There was probably not a morsel of meat in Abraham's camp, in any shape whatever. The usages of the Aeneze Arabs, as stated by Burckhardt, in his 'Notes on the Bedouins,' strikingly illustrate this entertainment prepared by Abraham for his visitants; and we know that, with some unimportant differences, the statement applies generally to other Arab tribes. Their usual fare (called ayesh) consists of flour made into a paste, and boiled with sour camel's milk. This is their daily and universal dish; and the richest sheikh would think it disgraceful to order his wife to prepare any other dish merely to please his own palate. The Arabs never indulge in animal food and other luxuries camel's milk is frequently handed round after a meal. Now in this account of the Arab mode of entertaining a stranger we have all the circumstances of Abraham's entertainment, if we change his 'calf' for a sheep, lamb, or kid. Here are the bread newly baked, the butter and the milk. If we should suppose that the process of boiling the choice parts of the calf was too long for the present occasion, we may conclude that the choice parts were cut up into small bits, and, being run upon small spits or skewers, broiled over the fire: this being a mode very common in the East of preparing a hasty meal of animal food. We have not supposed that the animal was dressed and served up entire, as that would have required more time than the haste of preparing a meal for merely passing strangers would allow. But amongst the Arabs, and indeed other Eastern people, it is 8 And he took butter, and | dressed, and set it before them; milk, and the calf which he had and he stood by them under the tree, and they did eat. h ch. 19. 3. fowls six or eight hours before they are cooked, and say we are fond of eating chettareyche, i. e. dead flesh. He adds, 'There are some Englishmen who become so accustomed to these things, that they have the chicken grilled, and on their table, which a quarter of an hour before was playing in the yard.'' Pict. Bible. not unusual at their entertainments to serve up a lamb or kid that has been baked whole in a hole in the ground, which after being heated and having received the carcase, is covered over with stones. It is less usual now in the East to kill a calf than it seems to have been in the times of the Bible. The Arabs, Turks, and others think it monstrous extravagance to kill an ani8. He took butter. "The continual mal which becomes so large and valu- mention of butter as an independent ble when full grown. This considera- dish, and as a proverbial sign of plenty, tion seems to magnify Abraham's liber-is calculated to astonish an European ality in being so ready to kill a calf for strangers.' Pict. Bible. - Gave it unto a young man. That is, to a ser reader. The word, as used in the Bible, implies butter and cream in various states of consistence. Annotators have Tdiscussed whether, in the present instance, the meat was dished up with butter, or that the latter formed an independent dish. It might well be both or either, if we judge from present Arab vant. See Note on Gen. 14. 24.Hasted to dress it. That is, to cook it. Judging from our modern notions of cookery, it may seem strange to many readers that a calf just killed should be immediately roasted. But the Ori-usages, which furnish ample illustraentals are still fond of eating meat just killed. It is said then to be tender and juicy. 'It seems to us rather revolting that the meat should be dressed and eaten so immediately after being killed. But it is still the custom in the East to dress meat very soon after the animal has been killed, and very often before the warmth of life has departed from it and in a journey we have ourselves often eaten boiled mutton in less than two hours after the sheep had been killed; and broiled mutton in a much shorter time. The custom doubtless originated in the heat of the climate, which precluded meat from being kept long; and, as a custom, came to be applied in seasons and regions where the originating cause did not immediately operate. Mr. Roberts, in a remark on 1 Sam. 28. 24, 25, observes, that in India the natives affect to be disgusted with the English for keeping : tions of the extraordinary use of butter among the Hebrews. The butter is usually made with the milk of sheep or goats, and is used to an excess which it seems amazing that the human stomach can bear. All Arab food, considered well prepared, swims in butter, and large quantities are swallowed in dependently in a solid or liquid state. Burckl:ardt mentions that those who can afford such luxury swallow every morning a large cup full of butter before breakfast; and even snuff a good quantity up their nostrils. Some tribes welcome a guest by pouring a cup of melted butter on his head. Our way of spreading butter thinly on bread seems the height of absurdity to them, and indeed to other Asiatics. When they do eat it with bread at all, it is in the way which was taught us by a Bedouin, who observing us sitting on the ground and refreshing ourselves with buttered bread and dates, looked compassion- | sweet milk is handed round after an Arab meal. They also make much use of butter-milk; and coagulated sour milk, diluted with water, is in very general use both among the Arabs and other inhabitants of Western Asia. Although unpleasant at first to strangers, the natives swallow it with avidity, and it is really famed to be very refreshing in a warm climate. Either this or sweet milk is probably intended in the text. They make cream by the usual process, which is scarcely inferior to that of Devonshire. From the frequent mention which is made of milk, milk meals must have been very common among the Hebrews, who seem to have been always, even in their settled state, more a pastoral than an agricultural people. In Prov. 27. 27, goat's milk, of course understood in its pre ately on our ignorance of the true use of butter, and to give us a valuable lesson on the subject, commenced breaking off a thin bit of bread, about the size of a crown piece, and heaping thereon as large a lump of butter as it would support, threw it into his mouth with great satisfaction. He pursued this instruction until his rapid progress towards the bottom of our butter skin obliged us to declare ourselves sufficiently instructed. Burckhardt, in allusion to the extraordinary use of butter among the Arabs, observes, the continual motion and exercise in which they employ themselves, strengthen their powers of digestion, and for the same reason an Arab will live for months together on the smallest allowance; and then, if an opportunity should offer, he will devour at one sit-parations, is mentioned as a principal ting the flesh of half a lamb, without any injury to his health.' This in some degree accounts for the extraordinary quantity of food which here and elsewhere we find prepared for a very few persons; or a reason perhaps is found in the existing practice throughout Western Asia of producing at entertainments from five to ten times the quantity of food which the invited guests can consume, the residue going to feast the women and the host of servants and dependents which men of consideration support. It is the same in camps, where a great number of hungry Arabs or Tartars got some benefit from the feasts which their sheikh or some wealthy person provides for a stranger.' Pict. Bible.- -T And milk. 'Milk, in its various forms, constitutes a principal article of diet among the Arabs and other pastoral tribes; and also enters largely as an ingredient into the composition of their prepared dishes. Many tribes live almost exclusively on dates and milk meals. Butter has been mentioned, and cheese will claim a future notice. When pasturage is good article of diet in a Hebrew household. The milk of goats is perhaps there mentioned as being of the best quality. It is decidedly so considered in the East. The Arabs drink camel's milk (see note on ch. 32. 15); but all their butter and cheese is made with the milk of goats and sheep, which are milked by the women every morning before daybreak. Cow's milk, where it is to be had, is held in comparative little esteem, and is, in fact, much inferior to that which our cows produce; perhaps because these animals cannot thrive well upon the wild and often scanty pastures of those regions.' Pict. Bible. -¶ Stood by them. Heb. A omad, was standing. Chal. 'Ministered unto them.' 'Standing,' in the idiom of the Scriptures, is often equivalent to waiting upon, serving, or ministering unto. Thus, Neh. 12. 44, 'Judah rejoiced for the priests and the Levites that waited;' Heb. ' that stood.' Jer. 52. 12, 'Neduzar-adan, captain of the guard, which served the king of Babylon.' Heb. 'stood before.' Jer. 40. 10, 'As for me, behold 1 will dwell at Mizpeh to |